The last time people walked on the moon was almost 50 years ago. It was a program to explore the moon and learn about its chemical makeup, gravity, moonquakes, and other things. In the future, people will not only look at it as a place to explore, but also as our eighth continent, a place to live and get resources.
Going back and forth between the Earth and the Moon
If we want to build a base on the moon, we need a low-cost, high-load shuttle between the Earth and the moon. In this way, we can send big instruments to the moon and make it easy for people to travel between the Earth and the moon.
Getting things on Earth out of the grip of gravity is not an easy thing to do. To reach an escape speed of 40,000 kilometers per hour, the rockets need extremely high speeds. For this, it needs a very large amount of fuel to give the lunar lander enough thrust. Today, most lunar landers are sent into space on multi-section rockets. When the fuel for each rocket runs out, the fuel tank and engine fall off and into the ocean, where they can’t be used again. It’s like building a very expensive, large, one-off airliner.
SpaceX has fixed this problem in the last few years, which is good news. They came up with the “recyclable multiplexed launch system.” After launching the first rocket, they were able to recycle it and reuse it for other launches. This makes it much cheaper for the lunar colonization program to move between the Earth and the Moon.
Move to the moon
In the past, astronauts could only stay on the moon for short periods of time. If the moon were to be colonized, they would need to build safe long-term homes there. Maybe the first thing everyone thought was, “Let’s build some tall buildings on the moon.” It’s not that easy, and the people on the moon have more problems than people on Earth.
First of all, there isn’t much air on the Moon. You might think that astronauts could breathe and live if they had a system like the one on the International Space Station. But that’s not all that’s wrong because of the thin air.
Meteorites can hit the Moon directly because there isn’t much air there. On Earth, meteorites break up and burn as they enter the atmosphere. This reduces the number of meteorites and slows down how often they hit the planet.
On the Moon, big and small meteorites hit more often than on Earth, and if they hit a building, the people inside will lose pressure and die from lack of oxygen.
The magnetic field of the Moon is also much weaker than that of Earth. So, cosmic rays hit the moon’s surface straight on and can’t be stopped by magnetic fields. Because the atmosphere is so thin, cosmic rays cannot be taken in. Recent studies have shown that astronauts are exposed to 200 times more radiation on the moon’s surface than on Earth. This makes the risk of cataracts and cancer much higher.
Scientists have found more than 200 “Lunar lava tube” on the surface of the moon. These tunnels are made of lava tubes that were formed by volcanic activity, and one of them is even bigger than Philadelphia, USA.
Multiple rare resources
If people on the moon want to live in darkness and never see the sun, why do we go to so much trouble to settle there? This is because the moon has a lot of rare materials like gold and titanium. We can make a lot of money if we can mine the moon and bring the goods back to Earth.
Besides these rare metals, helium-3 is the most important rare resource on the moon. Helium-3 is a great fuel for nuclear fusion, and it doesn’t give off any harmful radiation. Scientists think that the moon has a lot of helium-3, enough to give people all the energy they need for 10,000 years. On the other hand, there are only small amounts of helium-3 on Earth. This is because the thin atmosphere of the moon makes it easy for the solar wind to blow helium-3 off the surface of the moon.
Hydrogen monoxide, also known as “water,” is another common resource that is worth mining on the moon. We used to think that the moon had no water on it, but that wasn’t true. The oxygen in lunar rocks and the hydrogen in the solar wind come together to make water molecules. The price of water on the moon is like the price of oil on Earth. We can make the most powerful rocket fuel when we split water into hydrogen and oxygen and then cool the hydrogen to make it liquid.
Relay station to other planets
One day, the moon will be a way to get to other stars. Until then, the vehicle will first fly to the moon, fill up on liquid hydrogen fuel there, and then head into the depths of the universe. On other days, we won’t just be able to live on Earth. We’ll also be able to live on other stars, and we won’t think of ourselves as citizens of the world but as citizens of the universe. Are you ready? The moon is our key to the universe.
The Idea Of Colonize On Mars
Since the 20th century, a number of government agencies and private companies have planned trips for people to Mars.
The majority of human mission ideas now envisioned by national government space programs are not direct predecessors to colonization. Programs like those tentatively proposed by NASA, Roscosmos, and ESA are meant purely for exploratory flights; the building of a permanent base is a possibility but not the primary objective.
Colonization necessitates the creation of permanent ecosystems with the capacity for self-expansion and self-sufficiency. Robert Zubrin, an advocate for the colonization of Mars, supported the Mars Direct and Semi-Direct ideas as early suggestions for constructing dwellings on Mars.
The United Arab Emirates revealed a proposal to construct a community on Mars by 2117 at the 2017 World Government Summit, which was headed by the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Center.
In order to aid the ultimate colonization of Mars, SpaceX has suggested the creation of Mars transportation infrastructure. The mission architecture consists of totally reusable launch vehicles, human-rated spacecraft, on-orbit propellant tankers, rapid-turnaround launch and landing platforms, and in situ resource utilization for the generation of rocket fuel on Mars (ISRU). As of 2017, SpaceX’s aspirational objective was to land its cargo starships on Mars by 2024, followed by the first two crewed starships by 2026.
Problems Need To Solve Before Colonize On Mars
Gravitation and mass
Mars’ surface gravity is just 38% that of Earth’s. It is recognized that microgravity causes health issues such as muscle loss and bone demineralization.
Mars has half the radius and one-tenth the mass of Earth. This implies a smaller volume and a lower average density than Earth.
Magnetosphere
Due to the absence of a magnetosphere, solar particle events and cosmic rays can readily reach the surface of Mars.
The atmospher
The atmospheric pressure on Mars is far lower than the Armstrong limit for human survival without pressure suits. Habitable buildings on Mars would require pressure vessels comparable to spacecraft, capable of containing between 30 and 100 kPa of pressure.
This thin atmosphere does not filter out UV sunlight, which weakens the atomic bonds of molecules.
Climate And Water
The rovers Spirit and Opportunity have discovered less water on Mars than in the driest desert on Earth.
The average surface temperature is between 87 and 5 °C, which is significantly cooler than Earth.
Due to Mars’ about 52% greater distance from the Sun, the quantity of solar radiation entering its higher atmosphere per unit area (the solar constant) is approximately 43.3% of what enters Earth’s upper atmosphere.
Throughout the year, global dust storms are common and can blanket the whole globe for weeks, preventing sunlight from reaching the surface. These dust storms would have a long-term impact on the production of power from solar panels and interfere with communications on Earth.